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僧伽吒經

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Text ID
KR6h0032
Date
538–542
Dynasty
元魏

Sēngjiāzhā jīng 僧伽吒經

The Saṃghāṭa-sūtra (The Sūtra of the Bonded-Together Pair) by 月婆首那 (Upaśūnya, 譯)

About the work

The Sēngjiāzhā jīng in 4 fascicles is 月婆首那 Upaśūnya’s Eastern-Wèi 元魏 / 東魏 translation of the Saṃghāṭa-sūtra — a Mahāyāna sūtra of merit-doctrine that has retained widespread devotional use in the Tibetan, East Asian, and modern global Buddhist communities. The Taishō print signs the entry “元魏優禪尼國王子月婆首那譯” — “translated by Upaśūnya, prince of Ujjayinī (優禪尼) country, in the Yuán Wèi” — and explicitly cross-references No. 424 — KR6h0034, 施護 Dānapāla’s much later (Northern Sòng) retranslation under the title Dà jíhuì zhèngfǎ jīng. The Taishō text records 月婆首那 (Skt. Upaśūnya) as the prince of Ujjayinī in central India who entered Chinese service under the Eastern Wèi — one of the rare instances of an Indian royal prince acting as a Buddhist translator in the Chinese tradition.

Prefaces

No separate preface is preserved in the canonical print, only the standard signature.

Abstract

The Saṃghāṭa-sūtra is one of the most-copied Mahāyāna sūtras in the Indic and Central-Asian Buddhist tradition: extensive Sanskrit fragments survive from Gilgit, including a complete codex; the work is also preserved in Khotanese, Sogdian, Uyghur, and Tibetan versions; and recent excavations at Bāmiyān have produced additional Sanskrit material. The exceptional textual richness reflects the sūtra’s stature in the merit-of-copying tradition — the text contains its own self-recommendation as exceptionally meritorious to copy and disseminate. The opening gathers an assembly of twenty-two thousand bhikṣus at Vulture Peak, including the standard Mahāsaṃnipāta interlocutors Ājñā-Kauṇḍinya, Mahāmaudgalyāyana, 舍利弗 Śāriputra, Mahākāśyapa, Rāhula, Vakkula, and others. The body of the sūtra is the Buddha’s exposition to the bodhisattva Sarvaśūra of the merits of hearing, copying, and disseminating the Saṃghāṭa-sūtra itself, with extensive narrative parables of bodhisattvas of the past who attained release through their devotion to it.

The dating window 538–542 reflects the bracket of 月婆首那 Upaśūnya’s most active Eastern-Wèi translation period under 高歡 Gāo Huān and his successors. The Lìdài sānbǎo jì 歷代三寶紀 (T2034) records the work in his name.

Translations and research

  • von Hinüber, Oskar, ed. Die Erforschung der Gilgit-Handschriften. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1979. — Documentation of the Gilgit Sanskrit fragments of the Saṃghāṭa.
  • Canevascini, Giotto, ed. The Khotanese Saṅghāṭasūtra: A Critical Edition. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1993. — Standard edition of the Khotanese version.
  • Skilling, Peter. “Three Types of Bodhisatta in Theravādin Tradition: A Bibliographical Excursion.” In Buddhism and Jainism: Essays in Honour of Dr. Hojun Nagasaki, Kyoto, 2005, pp. 91–102. — On the Saṃghāṭa in cross-traditional context.
  • Jamspal, Lozang, tr. The Saṃghāṭa Sūtra: An Early Mahāyāna Treatise. Sarnath: Central University of Tibetan Studies, 2005. — English translation from the Tibetan.

Other points of interest

  • The Saṃghāṭa-sūtra is one of the most widely-copied Mahāyāna texts in the Sanskrit and Central-Asian manuscript tradition, with manuscript evidence considerably more abundant than for many doctrinally more important Mahāyāna sūtras. The disparity reflects the sūtra’s self-recommendation as a particularly meritorious object of copying — a textual feature that proved unusually effective at generating manuscript transmission.

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